"In Washington, U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said he believes the North is planning a space launch, but said the technology is no different from that of a long-range missile and its success would mean the communist nation is capable of striking the mainland U.S.

"I tend to believe that the North Koreans announced that they would do a space launch and that's what they intend," U.S. national intelligence director Dennis Blair said before a senate panel Tuesday.

"If a three stage space launch vehicle works, then that could reach not only Alaska and Hawaii but part of what the Hawaiians call the mainland and what the Alaskans call the lower forty-eight," he said.

...
U.S., South Korean and Japanese officials have warned Pyongyang not to launch either a satellite or missile — noting that both are the same in principle and differ only in payload.

North Korea is banned from any ballistic missile activity under a U.N. Security Council resolution adopted after the country's first-ever nuclear test blast in 2006.

Seoul's Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan renewed the warning that any launch would violate the U.N. resolution. "It's not that a satellite is OK and a missile is not," Yu told reporters. "